– by Trysh Ashby-Rolls –
Birthdays, weddings, funerals; each occurrence a family marker. I missed them all, banished as I was by my brother-in-law thirty years ago. So when I received his call last December saying I’d “better come” I supposed he meant my sister’s illness worse. He surprised me by inviting me to a celebratory lunch party. He paid for the air ticket and a hotel room, and off I went for a weekend in England. (Grey Matters, Seaside Magazine, January 15, 2015).
Released for the day from the rehab hospital where she was learning to walk again after a year-long stay – including six surgeries – in a neurological hospital, she sat in a wheelchair receiving friends and a family I didn’t know.
Uncertain what to do, despite my own experience in similar circumstances in 1988 waiting for spinal cord surgery, this was the younger sister who behaved like the older; the strong one who helped or hit me as she thought fit. Beautifully dressed in a red and purple jacket worn over black slacks and top, nails manicured and polished scarlet, we clinked champagne glasses. I pecked her on the cheek.
After lunch I stood to make a speech. Something brief about not always seeing eye to eye with her – I’ve forgotten what exactly – but that I loved her.
Last month my sister celebrated her seventieth birthday. The same sister I thought I might never see again after that extravagant Christmastime visit. Yet here she was, albeit still unable to walk, still in a wheelchair, but very much alive and in charge. While she opened the piles of mail, gifts, bottles of champagne and so many bouquets I quipped she should open a flower shop, she issued orders. We all scurried around doing her bidding.
In the kitchen her friends discussed ways in which she’d admonish them if they used the wrong dish or things weren’t presented properly. Suddenly, I burst out laughing with a realization. “She’s just like our mother – a perfectionist,” I explained. “Hey, let’s all relax, do our best and if what we do doesn’t match her vision, she doesn’t really have a leg to stand on – woops, so to speak.” Everyone giggled at the dark humour.
Then someone asked how come I’d stayed away so long. “Banished by my bro-in-law,” I said.
“You, too, huh? He’s done it to most of us.”
It wasn’t just me then. Apparently if he felt slighted he told people never to cross his doorstep again.
My great nephew and nieces arrived, bringing hugs. I was dragged off to look at various toys, pick raspberries from an overgrown veggie patch, asked if I wanted to play in the bouncy castle erected on a lawn mowed to Wimbledon tennis court standards. (No thanks.) Under the apple tree, tables covered in snowy linen cloths positively groaned under a huge ham, whole Scottish salmon, salads, and breads. A guest shouted that rain was forecast for precisely 3 p.m. “Eat up.” At 2.30 the heavens opened, soaking us all.
Someone carried my sister as we dashed indoors. Towels, cake and more champagne arrived. My nephews toasted their beloved mother, wishing her a happy birthday. My older nephew welcomed guests from near and far before turning toward me, “Especially Aunty Trysh who came all the way from Canada.” It was the icing on my cake. I was with my family, my real family, perfect and flawed in all the ways we humans are. I no longer feel there’s a piece missing from me.
